1. Field of the Disclosure
The present invention relates to a method for degrading Rhodamine B in the presence of BiOBr, particularly a method for photodegradation of Rhodamine B using radiation having a wavelength of from 440 to 554 nm, particularly 450 nm monochromatic light.
2. Description of the Related Art
The “background” description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description which may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly or impliedly admitted as prior art against the present invention.
Fujishima and Honda reported for the first time the photoelectrochemical water splitting by TiO2- and Pt-coated electrodes under UV light irradiation (Fujishima et al., Nature, 238, 37-38, 1972—incorporated herein by reference in its entirety). This moment is considered as the beginning of many investigations concerning the heterogeneous photocatalysis. Photocatalysis technology is now considered to be a promising approach to solve many energy and environmental problems because of the concept of “low-carbon and green life” (Hoffmann et al., Chem. Rev., 95, 69-96, 1995; Bae et al., Reac. Kinet. Mech. Cat., 106, 67-81, 2012—each incorporated herein by reference in its entirety).
Bismuth oxybromide (BiOBr) has attracted a lot of interest in both experimental and theoretical aspects (Huang et al., Mater. Sci., 43, 1101-1108, 2008—incorporated herein by reference in its entirety), because of its outstanding visible light driven photocatalytic performance as well as the potential applications in environmental remediation, such as treatment of dye-contained textile wastewater (Yu et al., Reac. Kinet. Mech. Cat., 103, 141-151, 2011; Shang et al., J. Hazard. Mater., 167, 803-809, 2009; Jiang et al., J. Photochem. Photobiol. A. Chem., 212, 8-13, 2010; Zhang et al., J. Colloid Interface Sci., 354, 630-636, 2011; Kong et al., Chem. Commun., 47, 5512-5514, 2011—each incorporated herein by reference in its entirety), heavy metal ions (Zhang et al., J. Hazard. Mater., 211-212, 104-111, 2012; Li et al., Eur. Inorg. Chem., 2012, 2508-2513, 2012—each incorporated herein by reference in its entirety), phenol-like pollutants (Zhang et al., J. Colloid Intergace Sci., 354, 630-636, 2011; Chang et al., Catal. Commun., 11, 460-464, 2010; Xu et al., Appl. Catal. B., 107, 355-362, 2011; Tian et al., Catal. Sci. Technol., 2, 2351-2355, 2012—each incorporated herein by reference in its entirety), indoor air pollutants (Ai et al., Environ. Sci. Technol., 43, 4143-4150, 2009—incorporated herein by reference in its entirety) and bacteria (Zhang et al., J. Hazard Mater., 211-212, 104-111, 2012—incorporated herein by reference in its entirety).
Even though the photocatalytic activity of BiOBr has been widely reported in these publications, it is worth mentioning that the contribution on photosensitized degradation performance of BiOBr is very rarely reported. In particular, none of the above publications, taken either singly or in combination, is seen to describe the method of photosensitized degradation of organic dyes in the presence of BiOBr. The photosensitized degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) dye in the presence of BiOBr reported so far uses a monochromatic 532 nm pulsed laser (Gondal et al., Appl. Catal. A. Gen., 397, 192-200, 2011—incorporated herein by reference in its entirety). However, such a procedure results in a degradation of RhB only under high temperature (>30° C.) and requires relatively large amount of BiOBr (>0.6 mg/mL).
One aspect of the present invention is to provide a method which addresses or overcomes at least some of the aforementioned problems associated with the prior art methods, particularly to provide a method which can more effectively and efficiently degrade RhB molecules.